Spinach Stuffed chicken

I saw this "recipe" on Pinterest the other day and thought it looked  delicious that I just had to try it. Only problem was, there was no real recipe to follow, just the images. It didn't really look hard, plus I already had an idea on how I would do it, so I just went for it. Here is my version of:

Spinach Stuffed Chicken 

Ingredients: 

• 4 Chicken breasts
• Ricotta cheese
• fresh mozzarella cheese
• Tomato pasta sauce 
• Spinach
• Shake and bake  (no-name brand)
• Oregano
• Rosemary
• Pepper

Prep time: 20 min

Cook time 1 hr. 

Step 1

First I smashed the chicken breast with a rolling pin to make them a bit thinner and easier to roll up.I like to put plastic wrap over them so my rolling pin doesn't get all chickeny and save a bit of clean up.

Step 2

Then I made the filling to stuff the chicken with. I cut up the spinach and I wilted it down in a pan with a bit of oil. Then I took the wilted spinach and mixed it with about half a container of ricotta cheese. I also added in my spices of oregano and rosemary and pepper to the mixture. Give it a good stir and mix it all up. 

Step 3
Next I assembled it all together.

I spread the spinach mix on the smashed chicken breast then rolled it up and secured it with a few tooth picks.

Then I rolled it in the shake and bake mix.

Place in Pan. (this is not the best pan for this. It was more like a bowl and while it worked, I flat bottom square pan probably would have worked better. It got a little soupy while cooking).

Step 4
I placed the open topped dish in the oven at 300c for 45 minutes. After the chicken was cooked, I took it out and spread the tomato sauce over the chicken and cut up the fresh mozzarella and placed on top. I threw it back in the oven for an additional 15 min to warm up the sauce and melt the cheese a bit.

Step 5
EAT! YUMM!

(This picture below was me and Jamie trying to be food photographers and staging the plate. Note the three pieces of lettice)

Overall, I would give this meal a 4 star rating (out of 5). The tomato sauce we had wasn't really right (it had sausages in it) and I could have beat the chicken a bit thinner to make for a more even roll.. I would definitely make it again though. 

(Sorry that some of the pictures are on their sides, I can't figure out how to rotate my pictures on Blogger...any ideas?)

Lotto Dreams

What would you do if you won the lottery? 

C’mon, I know you have thought about it, dreamed about it even. Do you have plans to invest and grow your winnings? Maybe it’s a lifelong dream to travel the world? Perhaps share the wealth with your family and friends?

I know I have thought about it.

Of course, I would go traveling for a bit, see some of the places that I have always dreamed about, France, Rome, New Zealand.  Perhaps help out a few family members and friends pay off their houses or whatever. But after that, I would need something more to fulfill my days. Plus, I don't just want to blow all my money and have nothing to show for it either. My plan always includes starting my own dream business that would be the best of work and play. Some of you may think it’s crazy to think that working is what you would do with your lotto money, but I want a legacy project that will live on long after I am gone; one that can be passed on to my children and to their children. So when people say my name, they said “ isn't she the one who built that amazing…”

Yes, a legend.

I have a few ideas kicking about in my head about what kind of business it would be. Obviously it would be something fun that doesn't really feel like work but rather something that makes me feel like I am on permanent vacation.  Like owning a cruise boat or having some chalet retreat. The latter is the one I most think about.

I would buy a big parcel of land near some kind of water body, like a lake or river or the ocean.  I would build one big main chalet that would serve as the check in area, restaurant, and meeting hall. I would build several cabin type accommodations along the water’s edge and connect them all by forest trails that you can walk or ride bikes on. We would also live on the property in the masters Chalet that would overlook it all. We would have canoes and boats for our guest and people could go fishing and bring back their catch to the kitchen and have our chief cook it up for you…

Ahhh...the dream.

Source

I know this is not a novel ideal. People have done these kinds of things before, so maybe I wouldn't be a “legend” per se, but maybe more like a local champion. Is that too much to ask?

What’s your lotto dream?

Ok..Back at 'er

So I know its been a while since my last post. I am notoriously bad at starting something and never finishing it. Like books. I can read a whole book right up to the last chapter or even 2-3 pages, then I'll put it down and never finish it. Maybe I have some kind of anti-finishing conditions. Look that up for me, will ya?

So what's new? Well as you saw in my last post way back in December, we are expecting baby number 2! We found out last month that the little bean inside is most likely a girl. The techs couldn't find a penis so I guess its a girl by default. We have a 3D ultrasound coming up in April to confirm the gender, but I'm pretty sure that its a girl. This pregnancy has been way different than my son's pregnancy. All in all, both good pregnancies, but so far with this one I'm not swelled up like a balloon like before. At the half way point in my last pregnancy, I had probably gained 20-25 lbs. With this one, up 8 lbs! Yahoo! Still got another 18 weeks left to go and that's when I will really grow, but I feel good about the way things are going so far.

As for the naming process...it's really hard to find a name that we like this time around. Me and Jamie are miles apart on our naming thought process and he wants to have the final say on the name which I am finding hard to let go of that control. He says that because I named our son (mostly true) that he gets to name this one. Yes, I had our sons name picked out for a long time, even before I met Jamie, but he also had a say in the name. If he really hated the name, he could have said something and we would have picked out another name. I'm a fair person, I can compromise. But with this baby, he wants the sole naming rights and says that I don't even get a say on the name. He even went as far as to suggest handing me a piece of paper when we are at the hospital with the name on it and that will be it, that's the name. YA RIGHT! My suggestion was for him to make up a list of his top 5 or 10 names, heck even 20 names and WE pick from that list. Sounds reasonable? Right?

Oh and the other thing, he says no middle name. Jamie doesn't have a middle name so he figures that this baby doesn't need a middle name either. I think he is just trying to make himself feel better as he was left out of the cool middle name circle and now he wants someone else to suffer like he did. It's kinda like a revenge thing I think. Again, I'm willing to compromise...let me pick the first name and I will consider no middle name (but really, this child will have a middle name!)

We still have about 4 month left before this baby makes her way into the world so we still have time to find a name, but he doesn't even want to discuss names at this point. Oh well, it will get worked out.

Wow, this kinda turned into a rant more than an update. Sorry. Actually, no I'm not sorry, my blog, my space to say what I want (nanabooboo).

Feel free to post your name suggestions too!

Fowler Family Christmas!

We Wish you a Merry Christmas!

From our Growing Family to Yours!

Christmas Party Mix

Looking for a gift for those people on your list that you know you should get something for, but you don't want to spend too much on? Like your postman, neighbor, or maybe just a friend that you don't see very often?

Well look no further than my Christmas Party Mix!

Its a thoughtful homemade gift that you can eat! And who doesn't like stuff to eat around the holidays? It's a pretty simple little recipe that doesn't take too long to prepare. And you can switch it up and add your favorite snacks and try different combinations too.

For mine, I had:

• No-name Cheerios (Oatie-O's)
• Shreddies
• Goldfish
• Pretzels
• Hickory Sticks
• Peanuts

I wasn't sure about the last 2 ingredients as some people are allergic to nuts and I just thought the hickory sticks might have been too much, so I left them out of the first batch but after some reconsideration, I added them to my second batch. 

For the sauce, it was:

• 2/3 to 1 cup Butter (melted)
• 4 tbs Soy Sauce
• 1/4 cup Brown Sugar
• 2 tbs Garlic Salt
• 1 tbs Salt

I'm not very good at measuring so I just winged it for the sauce. So the measurements above are just approximate. You can make it sweeter by adding more sugar, or more savory by adding more salt. But I would caution that most of the snacks are already pretty salty, so be careful not to add too much salt.

      

Step 1: Mix the dry ingredients together.

Pretty easy. Open the bags and dump them into a bowl. I didn't have a big enough bowl, so I did 2 trays.

Mix well.

         

Step 2: Mix Sauce

Melt the butter and add all the other ingredients to it. Stir until the sugar is dissolved.

At this point you should probably turn on your oven to about 200* F to preheat it.

Step 3: Pour Sauce over Mix

Pour the Sauce over the dry mix and stir well. There should be an even coating of the butter sauce over everything.
If your mix isn't already in a roaster, transfer it into one now.

Step 4: Bake
Put the roaster in the oven without the cover on.
Bake for about 1 hour 15 minutes or until toasty.
Check on the mix every 15 minutes and give it a good stir each time to make sure the mix is evenly baked.

It will still be a bit sticky even after they are done baking, but will harden up to a nice crunchy snack in a few minutes after being out of the oven

Step 5: Place in Containers

As I mentioned above, the mix will still be a bit sticky after you pull it out of the oven. It won't take long before they start to set and get hard and crunchy. I found it easier to scoop it into the tins while they were still in their warm sticky stage, so I would pop it back into the oven between filling each tin. If not, the mix becomes brittle and hard to scoop without breaking the snacks.

I found these Christmas tins down to the dollar store for $1.50 each so I got 9 of them. 

I also lined the tins with some wax paper.

Tada!! A little munchy crunchy tasty gift!

I was able to get 6 full tins out of my 2 batches...plus a little left over for our table. 

Thanks for reading!

Pekrul Family Pintrest Pinwheels

You know what I love? Collaborating with friends!

Our good friends Kim and Trevor contacted me last night to ask if I would share their Pintrest Pinwheel experience on my blog. My response...of course! It can be hard to come up with fresh new content all the time so I welcome the input and the interest in my blog.

So without further ado, here is the Pekrul Family Pintrest Pinwheels:
(as written by Kim Pekrul)

So, Trevor and I had an awesome day of baking these pinwheel cookies today.  We have never made these before, so it was a learning experience for both of us. We both love baking and cooking in the kitchen together. So we work well together.  The cookies are for our families second annual Christmas cookie exchange. I needed to make 13 dozen cookies.

I found the cute recipe for the cookies on Pinterest.  

It turned out we had ALL of the ingredients in our house to make them.  We just needed to buy blocks of margarine.

I did the creaming of the butter and sugar. Trevor measured the dry ingredients. If you read the process it takes to make these pinwheels it was pretty tedious…but there was just a slight learning curve, and after making 2 batches of cookies we felt like we were experts.

Instead of adding chocolate we added food coloring to half the batch. (and peppermint/vanilla  to the butter/sugar/egg mixture) They turned out to be very pretty. We rolled the two colors together, then rolled the logs in different colors of sprinkles. Pink/yellow/purple/blue.

Taylor had 2 of his friends over today. So they helped a bit. (Sapphire and Arianna) So fun baking with my son and his two (girl) friends!

The recipe says to roll the two layers together, put them in cling wrap and put them in the fridge for 3 hours or over night. We cut that in half by placing our logs outside for an hour (hey we live in the north LOL)

Then we sliced the logs into perfect little cookie shapes and baked them for 8-10 min. So fun.

The end.

Thanks Kim,Trevor, and family! Wish I could have a taste of your treats, they look awesome!

And if anyone is interested in being a guest blogger, just let me know, I would love to collaborate with you too!  b

                                                                                                                    

On the first day of Christmas...

...My mommy made with me, a batch of chocolate chip cookies!

Well it's finally December and time to bring on the family Christmas Traditions!

As you may recall, I have already made a Sock Advent Calender for Hunter to start the count-down to Christmas, but I thought it would also be nice to try and do an activity related to Christmas as well.

Now, I'm no super Mom and while I am aiming for 24 activities and some can be done together, there is no guarantee that all will get done. I figured it best to make a list of all the thing that I want to accomplish and try and knock them off my list as the days go by and we get closer to Christmas.

Here's my list so far:

Christmas Activities:

1. Bake some cookies and treats
2. Go to local craft fairs
3. Bake perogies
4. Attend Santa Clause Parade and Tree Lighting
5. Watch "How the Grinch Stole Christmas"
6. Send Christmas Cards
7. Watch or read "A Christmas Carol"
8. Make a gift
9. Make paper snow flakes
10. Take a family Christmas Photo
11. Go Christmas Shopping
12. Wrap Gifts
13. Invite friends over for a Christmas Cheer
14. Make Party Mix as a gift
15. Get a tree
16. Decorate the tree
17. Sing Carols
18. Donate toys
19. Have a family game night
20. Decorate a Ginger Bread House
21. Make a Christmas Craft (for the tree or for the house)
22. Visit friends and family
23. Read "The Night Before Christmas"
24. Go to Church on Christmas Eve

So this weekend I started with the first thing on my list...Baking cookies!

This was pretty easy as my Mother-in-law had slipped a tub of pre-made cookie dough into Hunter's bag one day last week. The dough can be frozen, but once it is thawed out, it will only last for about 5 days in the fridge. Since by the time I took it out of his bag it was already thawed, and was already in my fridge for 4 days, they needed to be baked this weekend!

So after all my hard work of prepping the dough (i.e. taking it out of the fridge), we were ready to start cutting the shapes and baking the cookies!

I had my little "helper" Hunter help me roll out the dough and cut out the cookies. He was pretty into it too! Correction, he was into playing with the dough and throwing it all over the kitchen. Oh well, we had some fun doing it. 

Next it was into the oven for about 10 minutes a batch then on the rack to cool. In about an hour, we had a mountain of cookies to eat...and eat them we did! I thought "wow, how are we ever going to eat that many cookies?" But this morning when I woke up, there were only about 8 left (must have some mice in the house lol) 

Thanks for reading and stay tuned as we work our way through our list.

Do you have any Christmas Traditions that our family does every year? Share them with me!